In a lot of ways, Verizon's FiOS service has always been about showing off more than it's been about making money. Back in August Verizon proved that again when they created an experimental 1Gbps fiber network in Massachusetts. Now here we are again talking about Verizon's fiber trials. But as DSL Reports tells us, this time they've hit 10Gbps.

The test was done using a pre-release standard XG-PON2 system designed by Alcatel-Lucent. The endpoint of the network was seeing true 10Gb up and downstream connections. This is all well and good, but it's not hitting your street anytime soon. Verizon is still rolling out their 100Mb GPON-based FiOS. The XG-PON2 standard is far from complete as well. XG-PON1 isn't even ratified yet.

Still, it's nice to see this technology exists. It's comforting to know that someday when the rest of our PCs catch up, 10Gb internet may be waiting for us.

Google has just announced the next step in their plans to build out super high-speed fiber internet in the US. The Big G will be building a fiber network capable of 1Gbps speeds for Stanford University's Residential Subdivision. This is a group of about 850 faculty and staff owned home on the Stanford campus. Google will be starting the project in early 2011.

This is separate from Google's Fiber for Communities initiative to gift super broadband to a few small to medium cities around the US. Google clarified that this Stanford rollout was a sort of "beta test" for the eventual fiber deployments elsewhere. We can't say we're surprised, seeing as Google loves their beta tests.

Google decided to go with Stanford because the school was willing to have their streets worked on to install the fiber, it had a manageable number of homes, and it's just so darn close to Google HQ. We also wouldn't be surprised if there were some Stanford Alums working at Google.

If you were to take a stroll along the Columbia river in Oregon. You might find the quaint city of Dalles. In Dalles, is a sizable Google data center. All that data needs some fat pipes to flow through, so The Big G installed dedicated fiber lines to the facility. The only problem is that the hanging fiber lines make tempting targets for bored hunters. For the last few years, Google has been plagued by outages caused by hunters opening fire at the lines each winter.

Whenever these lines are damaged, Google technicians have to make their way into the wilderness to repair them. Some of these locations can be remote, requiring a Caterpillar tractor, or even a helicopter to reach if the weather is poor. On one occasion, some lines were shot down during a snowstorm. The repair crew had to cross-country ski for three days to get to the damage and repair it.

After realizing this was a losing battle, Google recently decided to build an underground channel for the fiber lines. Presumably, the hunter will leave the lines alone if the tantalizing fiber is hidden from their immediate view.

In a Verizon statement today, the company announced that a recent field test of their fiber optic network showed near gigabit speeds. The test was carried out in Taunton, Mass with the help of a business customer. The customer saw speeds of 925Mbps when connected to the local Verizon office. Drop off was not as bad as you might expect. Speeds as high as 800Mbps were recorded with test servers over 400 miles away.

This is Verizon has been able to demonstrate these speeds in a real-life scenario. Google attracted a lot of attention when they started searching for a community to hook up with experimental 1Gbps broadband service. Verizon's accomplishment is different because it uses an existing network, with new gigabit passive optical network (GPON) switches.

Verizon's current FiOS service is offered at 50Mbps, and no word is available on if faster speeds will be rolled out in the wake of this test. Some feel the Taunton test was done mainly to demonstrate that the fiber network could handle future uses like 3DTV. How fast is your home internet service? Are FiOS-level speeds even available to you?

Google began accepting applications from towns and cities back in February to be part of their new high-speed fiber broadband initiative. While the winning municipalities won’t be announce until later this year, Google is looking to help everyone get some faster internet access. To these ends, the search giant is launching the Google Fiber for Communities site.

This isn’t going to be some sort of magical site to get that sweet, sweet Google fiber, but rather a site to help communities get there themselves. Google said in the blog post that they were inspired to do this after seeing the 1,100 community applications and 200,000 individual responses to their fiber initiative. It's nice, but we'd rather have Google do it for us.

The site offers information about federal legislation and zoning that affect fiber deployment. They also link to various organizations that could be of help. We would like to see better connection become common place. Could the Google Fiber for Communities site help us get there?

If you were holding out hope that Verizon would run some fiber to your house and save you from the cable company, think again. A Verizon spokesperson has clarified the company’s position on the future of FiOS. Verizon will not be laying any fiber in cities where it is not already underway. They will, however, be continuing to hook up homes and businesses in cities where the rollout has already started.

Verizon is still negotiating for so-called franchise arrangements to begin rollout in some small communities, but called off talks with larger municipalities like Alexandria, VA. The original intention of FiOS was to reach 18 million customers by the end of 2010, and they are likely to reach that goal. We just didn’t think they’d completely stop after that. Still, it isn't surprising given the approximately $1,350 it costs just to get a new customer up and running.

It seems likely that in the midst of the economic downturn, the value proposition became less attractive to Big Red. Adoption slowed as consumers tightened their belts, and Verizon shifted resources to the more lucrative mobile business. AT&T and Qwest are both laying fiber into neighborhoods, but are running copper lines to individual houses. We’d like to hold out hope that fiber may one day find its way into everyone’s home, but we aren’t optimistic for the near term.

Google owns a lot of network infrastructure around the country, and now it looks like they plan to put some of it to work. On the Google blog today, the Mountain View company announced that they plan to offer “experimental” high-speed internet service in select markets. When you hear how fast, you’ll want to be in one of those markets. Google says the new service will offer speeds of around 1 gigabit per second. Just let that sink in. As for price, Google would say only that it would be “competitive”.

The search giant claims only benevolent motives in this course of action. “Our goal is to experiment with new ways to help make Internet access better and faster for everyone,” Google said in the post. Google points specifically to what developers might do with nearly unlimited bandwidth as something they will watch. They also hope to gain experience in running large fiber networks. Google also promises to manage the network in open and non-discriminatory ways. Clearly, Google plans to use this opportunity to showcase how net neutrality should work.

Communities interested in being part of this grand experiment have until March 26th to submit a request for information. Google says they plan to offer the fiber service to at 50,000-500,000 individuals. Both local governments and individuals are able to nominate a community. So maybe go have a chat with your mayor after you submit your own request. How does Google provided broadband make you feel, excited or paranoid?

In Norway, Lyse has quickly become the largest fiber-to-the-home provider thanks to their innovative new business model that asks their customers to preregister before any fiber is dug, and then offers then $400 savings if they dig up their own trench from the street to their home. So far, 80 percent of their customers have taken them up the offer.

According to Herbjørn Tjeltveit of Lyse, “They (the customer) can arrange things just the way they want,” which has made for happier customers. Evidently, Nordic folk have issues with a corporation digging through their meticulously planted flower gardens.

All this support has given Lyse some breathing room as well – having jumped from 500 to 130,000 customers in just over a year, they’ve got quite a bit of money to use for infrastructure. Word is that they’re already testing both 100Mbps and 1,000Mbps connections.